Prosecutor Svetlana Kildisheva, during a hearing in the Golovinsky District Court of Moscow in the case of Memorial co-chairman Oleg Orlov about “discrediting” the army, demanded a forensic psychiatric examination for the human rights activist. This was reported by a Mediazona correspondent from the courtroom.
Before the start of the debate, Kildisheva, “having analyzed Orlov’s behavior” in court and the previous criminal cases brought against him, also asked to schedule a forensic psychiatric examination. Among the complaints against the human rights activist, she listed “a heightened sense of justice, a complete lack of instinct of self-preservation, constant posturing.”
Orlov’s defender, the editor-in-chief of Novaya Gazeta Dmitry Muratov, objected to her. He emphasized that the state prosecutor could not see with the naked eye whether there were age-related changes in the blood vessels of Orlov’s brain. The co-chairman of Memorial also opposed the examination.
Photo: Alexandra Astakhova/“Mediazona”
Orlov has been under recognizance not to leave the place since March 21. On the same day in Moscow, security forces came with searches to nine Memorial employees, as well as to the offices of the human rights organization. The investigative actions were related to the case on the rehabilitation of Nazism (clause “c” of Part 2 of Article 354.1 of the Criminal Code), which was opened at the beginning of the month.
After the searches, the employees were taken for interrogation, all detainees were released as witnesses. However, a case was opened against Orlov for “discrediting” the army.
The reason for this was a post by a human rights activist on Facebook, which he wrote on November 14, 2022. “The bloody war unleashed by the Putin regime in Ukraine is not only the mass murder of people. <…> This is also a severe blow to the future of Russia,” says the beginning of the text.
Prosecution expert Natalya Kryukova believes that Orlov is engaged in “anti-Russian human rights activities.” Kryukova’s colleague Alexander Tarasov called the assertion that military operations should not be carried out against the civilian population a stereotype. Activists of Veterans of Russia gave testimony against Orlov.